


delicately and lovingly tending to ryuji’s wounds in a straight way

by foxmulder_whereartthou



Category: Persona 5, Persona Series
Genre: Band-Aids, Boys Being Boys, Boys Kissing, Homoeroticism, Hurt Sakamoto Ryuji, Injury, Let Sakamoto Ryuji Say Fuck, Love Confessions, M/M, Minor Injuries, i suppose :flushed:, ryujis mother is a darling i am so glad the fans took her in, wow i adore them. fucking idiots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:01:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24727888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxmulder_whereartthou/pseuds/foxmulder_whereartthou
Summary: BRO I WAS HOMOEROTICALLY CLEANING AND PATCHING UP MY FRIEND’S WOUNDS AND YOU RUINED IT. I WAS SCOLDING HIM FOR BEING AN IDIOT IN AN EXASPERATED BUT FOND TONE OF VOICE WHILE I TENDERLY BANDAGED HIS KNUCKLES AND WE BOTH TRIED UNSUCCESSFULLY TO AVOID LOOKING INTO EACH OTHER’S EYES UNTIL THE TENSION BETWEEN US BECAME UNBEARABLE WHEN YOU ENTERED THE ROOM WITHOUT KNOCKING AND FUCKING KILLED THE MOOD. WHAT THE HELL, MAN.
Relationships: Kurusu Akira/Sakamoto Ryuji, Persona 5 Protagonist/Sakamoto Ryuji
Comments: 8
Kudos: 142





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hecksalmonids](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hecksalmonids/gifts).



“Ow, fuck,” Ryuji groaned, scrunching up his nose as Akira wiped down a large gash on his cheekbone with a generous helping of antiseptic. 

“Stop moving,” Akira murmured, lifting a hand to hold Sakamoto’s face still, his fingertips ghosting over his cheek. “You’ve gotta let me clean it.”

At Kurusu’s touch, Ryuji froze up, a hot flush abruptly making itself known on his face. The air in Leblanc’s attic suddenly felt stifling, the walls closing in on just the two of them. Biting his lip, Akira swiped his thumb over a particularly bad bruise on Ryuji’s neck, brow furrowing. Due to their close quarters, Ryuji could feel Akira’s hot breath on his neck, and it took everything within him not to shake. 

For barely a moment, Akira glanced up into Ryuji’s eyes, looking for a sign of pain, only to- shit. Fuck. God fucking damn it. 

Ryuji’s eyes were so beautiful, pools of chocolate brown, hazy with sleepiness and the general relaxed feeling that came with the scent of coffee and comfiness here in Leblanc. But this wasn’t the time to get lost in them, there were still more cuts to clean, and-

He was looking back, CODE RED, CODE RED, Ryuji was looking back. 

“‘Kira?” Akira blinked, and Ryuji tensed, shuddering, but not looking away. Never looking away. Steadying a hand on the back of Sakamoto’s neck, wreathed in moonlight, a silence fell over the room.

Without notice, they were interrupted by the pitter-patter of little cat feet on flimsy wood flooring, the two of them scrambled away from each other, the plastic first aid box going flying and landing with a clatter on the floor, scattering medical supplies everywhere and wasting a good half-bottle of antiseptic.

In that sly, noticeably Phantom-Thief tone of voice he used when he knew much more than what he let on, Mona smirked, “And what are you two up to?”

Ryuji could’ve sworn he heard Kurusu hiss a badly disguised ‘shit’ under his breath.


	2. Chapter 2

The next time it happened, their roles were flipped. 

After unexpectedly getting surrounded by shadows on what should’ve been a relaxed Mementos run, most of the group (especially Akira) were definitely looking worse for wear. Despite his protests that he could get home fine, Ryuji didn’t trust him - and Akira had barely taken two steps towards his train before collapsing back into his arms. 

“Idiot should’a listened to me,” Sakamoto mumbled, doing his best to ignore the blush rising on his cheeks, half-guiding and half-carrying Joker towards the turnstiles. After all, his mother wouldn’t be back until late, and the both of them were in desperate need of a warm bed and the bandages at the back of the kitchen cupboard. 

And so here they were, Kurusu slumped over, sitting atop the counter, while Ryuji fumbled around the grazes on his face and his shoulder, sticking multi-coloured bandaids over Akira’s nose, his neck, over the gash above his eyebrow that just refused to stop bleeding. 

Suddenly, Akira seemed to rouse out of his stupor.

“Thank god, bro, I thought you were a goner there,” he chucked, nervous. “Fo’real, are you okay?”

Taking him completely by surprise, instead of replying, Akira giggled.

“Hey ‘Yuji. There’s two of you! That’s nice.” 

Alarm bells going off in his head, nearly cracking his skull with concern, Ryuji distantly remembered Akira getting hit by some status effect - something none of them, not even Morgana, were familiar with. This was bad. This was really bad. 

“Are you feeling any, uh, better?” Ryuji stammered, worriedly side-eyeing Kurusu.

“Better? I’m fine! I’m Joker!” he snorted, gazing towards Sakamoto, who now had a somewhat horrified look on his face. “Hi Ryuji~”

**FUCK.** THIS WAS GOING TO BE THE DEATH OF HIM, HE WAS SURE OF IT. 

“Um, Aki, let’s go into my room, you could probably do with a lie down,” Ryuji half-stuttered, half-gasped out, because in his efforts to help him get down from the table top, Akira had grabbed the lapels of his Shujin blazer, and was steadily inching Sakamoto towards him. 

“Aki?” Kurusu drawled, already exhausted, “That’s a cute nickname, Ryu-chan.”

At this point, Ryuji was nothing more than a garbled mess of bright red cheeks and shaking fingers, still stinging with disinfectant - and just as he thought the day couldn’t get any more embarrassing, it did. 

Time passed differently in Mementos, kind of like how homoerotically patching up your friend’s wounds stretched every moment touching him out to an eon, so Ryuji had never thought about the concept of ‘late’ at all.

It just so happens that this elusive ‘late’ was now, and in the hallway, he could hear a jingle of keys.

Akira, however, had not heard this at all, and shoddily swung his arm around Ryuji’s shoulders, hooking him in closer. 

“I’ve got a secret, Ryu-chan,” he giggled, and in his grasp all Ryuji could do was stare at the door in anticipative horror.

“This isn’t really the time, Akira, you can tell me tomorrow, okay?”

“Yeah but I.. I gotta tell you now!”

The handle turned, and the click of the mechanism reverberated around the room. 

“Ryu-chan, I lo-”

His mother was in the doorway, her shocked expression slowly morphing into a knowing smile.

What a sight they must’ve been; a still-giggling Akira leaning into a very red Ryuji, and yet the only thing on his mind was just what the hell Joker had been trying to say.


	3. Chapter 3

Akira had patched up Ryuji’s wounds before - he’d had to learn how to, after their first big Palace run, when the two of them were so beat up they’d barely made it up the stairs to the attic before collapsing over each other. This time, however, was different. Instead of unimaginable hulking creatures having hurt Ryuji, it was the fists of some snot-nosed, apathetic  _ asshole _ .

It was hard to steady his hands, he was so angry. How dare someone hurt him, how dare someone other than Akira lay a fucking finger on him. When he was on the phone to Takemi, asking for the signs of a broken nose while guiding Sakamoto to one of the booth seats in the cafe, he could barely keep his composure.

“Hey, ‘Kira, you okay there?”

“Oh. Oh, yeah. Sorry.” Distracted, his arm had been suspended in midair, shaking with rage. Quickly correcting himself, he fussed over Sakamoto’s injuries more tenderly than usual, although he felt more like a girlfriend than a mother. 

Girlfriend. Ryuji’s girlfriend. Akira offered another tissue to stop the persistent flow of blood streaming out of Ryuji’s nose. Dating Ryuji, holding his hand. Stargazing, valentines, movie theatres. Tossing his glasses aside, Akira put his deft fingers to use in securing a thin piece of medical tape to fix a piece of gauze to the side of his face. Being the one Ryuji would think about every day, holding him, kissing hi-

“You’re looking a little spacey there, man, are you sure you’re fine?”

“Yeah, I just,” thought about kissing him? He couldn’t say that. “You’re the one we should be worrying about, ‘Yuji.” 

Much to Akira’s dismay, Ryuji chucked, and then instantly winced, pain still shooting through his face.

“I was so worried, you know. Why didn’t you leave? Why didn’t you call me?”

Ryuji looked down, refusing to meet Kurusu’s eyes. “I was cornered, I told you. There were three of them and one of me - you know how busy the shopping street is at this hour.”

Deciding to focus on wiping dirt off of Sakamoto’s forehead, Akira didn’t reply, but just set his jaw and bit down on the words threatening to escape him.

Unluckily for him, Ryuji didn’t have as much of a filter.    
  


“Why do you care so much anyway? You should’ve seen the other guy, he-”

“Yes, but you still got hurt! God, Ryuji, I- you can’t keep doing this to me.” Akira let out a dark, uneasy laugh. “I can’t help worrying about you, Ryuji, I-”

Once again, he was interrupted by the click of a handle, only this time for it to be accompanied by the controlled ring of the bell above the cafe door. 

“Hi,” Takemi said, in her effortlessly casual way, leaning against the doorframe, “I’m guessing you don’t need my help then?”

Taken off guard, he nodded, but her gaze flitted from Sakamoto’s face to his own, drinking up the meaning behind their eyes and letting realisation turn the corners of her eyes up in a rare, genuine way. 

“Okay boys, be safe. Call me if you need any help. See you tomorrow, kid.”

Akira buried his face in his hands.


	4. Chapter 4

Neither of them could ignore it.

On their own, their feelings were already too resolute, too fully-formed to be questioned or ignored, but after their last three… well… intrusions, it was clear others were picking up on it. 

All in one day, Akira found a note tucked into Morgana’s collar, reading ‘tell him’ in barely legible chicken-scratch, like someone without opposable thumbs had tried to hold a pen. After buying medicine from Takemi, one of the bottles had an odd sounding rattle - which turned out to be a rolled up slip of paper, also nearly unreadable, but in the way that doctor’s handwriting never was. With enough scrutiny and the help of his phone’s camera, Akira found that the note read ‘you’re fooling nobody’. Hell, even Sojiro was shooting him knowing looks, leaving words scribbled into the steam on the counter. 

Similarly, Ryuji found post-its in his school bag, under his pillow, even stuck onto the bathroom mirror. He tore them all down, red in the face for more than one reason. 

That afternoon, Skull and Joker went into the Palace alone one last time, doing a sweep of the place for forgotten chests, leftover shadows, and possible routes of escape before sending the calling card. It was just so that they’d work up the courage while patching each other up in a safe room, lying back to absorb the scenery. 

They sat cross-legged facing each other atop the table, Akira sticking a plaster over the bridge of Ryuji’s nose while he worked on rummaging through the pockets of Joker’s coat, trying to find a good flavour of energy drink to get them up and running again. 

“I love moments like these,” Joker mused, dropping the facade of an unwavering headstrong leader while he could be here, alone, tucked away with Sakamoto.

Not even bothering to hide the rosiness in his cheeks, he quirked an eyebrow. “What do you mean? There’s nothing special about fixing each other up, bro.”

“That’s exactly it!” Kurusu laughed, fully throwing his head back, “It’s the little things, you know?”

Tracing a gloved finger up Ryuji’s arm, not giving him much time to barely suppress a full-body shudder, Akira continued. 

  
“I… I think, I think I love you, Ryuji.”

Although he hung his head, Skull tilted his face back up with a hand resting on his chin, tears pricking at the side of his eyes, smiling from ear to ear. “You think?”

“No, I,” Akira started, flustered, leaning his forehead against Ryuji’s, finally looking into his eyes without regret or restraint or interruption, “I’m sure. I love you.”

“I love you too, Aki.” All of a sudden, he plastered on his Skull-patented smirk. “Bet you can’t kiss me though. I fucking dare you. Go on, I-” 

Kissing with a band-aid on your nose  _ is _ uncomfortable, they found, but easy enough to ignore if it was placed there by the one you love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bro, We Are Teens . Its Ok To Cry Around Me . Im Ur Best Friend . I Love You . ... Bro, We Are Kiss ing Now . . No Dont Stop Bro .. Bro ...
> 
> hope you enjoyed this mess of a fic!!  
> i love u all <33


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